My second session on Wednesday 6th September
at the Hindi BMC School, Malad was a
little different from my first. Although I was a bit more comfortable in what
to do and how to engage with the children, this time I faced a class of
secondary instead of primary children.

Similarly to the
previous session Laxman kicked off the hour with two icebreakers, the first the
‘introduce yourself with an accompanying action’ game like the previous session
and the secondCharades. A game which in
my experience must be used universally by teachers all over the world.

The
class was then split into four different groups; A, B, C and D. With Laxman
asking the students to tell him these letters of the alphabet before writing them
on the board. It became clear to me that every aspect of this play session was
an opportunity and chance for these children to learn. A child from each team
was then chosen and given an action to perform for another team to then guess,
whilst some students seemed a little nervous others were raring to have a turn.
Not only did charades act as a means to make the children feel more comfortable,
I felt it also taught some students confidence and a lesson on the value of
teamwork.

Following the
icebreakers the board games were once again distributed amongst the students,
with games being shared between groups of 2-4. However, this is where I
encountered a few more difficulties in comparison to the previous play session.
Although some of the games were the same as those used for the primary session
there was a selection of more complicated games, which because of the language
barrier I found quite tricky to communicate with the children.

I think there is
only so much you can show a child with actions when the game is more complex
and with a limited number of common words at my disposal I really struggled.
Nonetheless, Laxman was on hand to help explain the more complicated games and
I was once again able to play the simpler games with students. Reflecting on my
play session I think it was definitely easiest to communicate and teach the
children the maths rather than logic based games - as they say maths is a
universal language!

It was in this
second session that Laxman informed me that one of the students attendance at
school wasn’t that great. At this point Laxman then addressed the class
informing them that the more frequently they attended school the more often
they would be able to participate in a play session. I realised then that
Toybank are not just providing these children with an hour of play but they are
also helping motivate them by providing an incentive for them to attend school
on a regular basis. This I think serves to highlight the incredible importance
and role Toybanks play sessions are having in these childrens lives.

Whilst perhaps
trickier in some ways this second session was as equally as rewarding and
eye-opening as the first. Meeting each and every child was an incredible
experience as they were all so welcoming and friendly despite our difficulties
communicating. Although by the end of the day I was quite exhausted from my
hours of play all the children made my day a brilliant and unique experience.

Toybank, an initiative under The Opentree Foundation, is an organization in India that promotes the Right to Play for all children, because a happy childhood defines almost every aspect of a child’s life and in turn the society. Founded in August 2004, our motto is to provide every economically-disadvantaged child an equal opportunity to education, achieved through healthy play and games.
As of January 2018, Toybank has set up 276 Play Centers and impacts the lives of 43,009 at-risk children every day.